No personal criticism implied. Just making the point that if you are the only one who can see a problem even after pointing it out, you are tilting at a windmill that might be more dangerous than a dragon: a dragon can be killed, the windmill cannot.
While the immediacy of the loss of human life is a stark motivator, it is interesting to consider the cost in lives of a failure of a billion dollar program. If we make a ballpark estimate of $100,000 per man year involved in the program, a billion dollar program represents 10,000 man years. If we consider a human life to occupy forty man-years, the program represents 250 human careers. This is a crude calculation, and it is actually worse than that, because after all if the program fails the program people don¹t have to give back the money they earned for their time. The loss is to the people who paid for the program (taxpayers), and they on average don¹t get paid $100 K per year. Ken Javor Phone: (256) 650-5261 From: John Allen <[email protected]> Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2016 19:36:21 -0000 To: 'Ken Javor' <[email protected]>, <[email protected]> Subject: RE: [PSES] Practical ethics? -- text version Ken I understand where you were coming from my ³defence², if it may be called that, was that it looked like these (likely to be inadequately-equipped for NVG operations) vehicles were going to be used a lot at night by inadequately-trained operators in very difficult and challenging Afghanistan terrain (you only had to see some of the photos that we were shown of severe accidents that had already happened in daylight to immediately understand that!). Therefore serious, likely some fatal, accidents were going to happen PDQ if the issues were not properly addressed before the vehicles and operators were sent there and this was at a time when there were very serious public concerns about the numbers of British troops already being injured and killed in that country. John E Allen W.London, UK From: Ken Javor [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 27 December 2016 19:09 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [PSES] Practical ethics? -- text version ³If neither customer nor supplier wanted what you were selling, then the personal fallout to you is not surprising, regardless of how important the feature was/is. Faced with a similar situation, I have taken a less extreme approach. This is where John Allen and I part company. Faced with this level of short-sighted stupidity, I gave up reasoning with them and went into personal protection mode, as detailed above. There was no point at tilting at the windmill any longer. It was clearly a windmill, not a dragon and it wasn¹t going anywhere. The Serenity Prayer comes to mind here, even if you are a radical atheist - it applies.² Ken Javor Phone: (256) 650-5261 From: John Allen <[email protected]> Reply-To: John Allen <[email protected]> Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2016 17:53:28 -0000 To: <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [PSES] Practical ethics? -- text version Ken Take your point to a degree, but the fact of the matter was that neither our customer nor the MoD wanted to take the responsibility until pushed very hard by me which left me in the ³middle of the deep blue sea² and without much of a ³paddle². Luckily for the project, in this case, events worked out OK - but unluckily not for me personally (having taken what I considered to be the ethical stance) L. John E Allen W. London From: Ken Javor [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 27 December 2016 15:51 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [PSES] Practical ethics? -- text version War definitely puts a stress on the procurement process. That process was not designed to field things quickly (speaking as a citizen of the USA). A wartime procurement does require some intelligent analysis of what can be streamlined and what is ironclad. In this case of NVG compatibility, the MoD might have been contacted to get their take on it, they being the customer. If they can¹t be convinced to sign up to it, the vendor can¹t be held accountable. If they do want it, and it wasn¹t in the original contract, then it is time for an engineering change order, more money and time for the vendor and everyone is happy... One way or the other it will get done; it¹s just more efficient to take care of it up front. Ken Javor Phone: (256) 650-5261 From: John Allen <[email protected]> Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2016 15:39:02 -0000 To: 'Ken Javor' <[email protected]>, <[email protected]> Subject: RE: [PSES] Practical ethics? -- text version Ken You are almost certainly correct on all counts UK MoD Requirements specs have often been deficient, especially if someone boiler-plated them from another project, and then didn¹t get to think about the detail of what might actually be required, such the use of NVG in this case. Even ³worse² was that those armoured tractors were purchased under an Urgent Operational Requirements (UOR) contract, which probably meant ³get them PDQ & bu**ger the details², which meant that various people were under pressure to deliver quickly and be ³amenable² to ³short-cuts² where they thought these were of little consequence &/or would not be noticed (except by the likes of myself!). Nevertheless, in the wider context, this sort of thing can place a great strain on the ethics of the ³guy in the middle² who understands what actually needs to be done and ³speaks his mind², but is then put under considerable pressure from various sides to be less ³proscriptive²/ ³demanding². What actually happens then is the result of just how far both sides are prepared push their arguments, and with what amounts of pressure and influence Decades ago, a company I worked for had an MD who said something like ³I¹ll sign the certificates because that¹s what I get paid for², but rarely if ever actually asked for any supporting evidence. Ethics? What ethics? John E Allen W. London, UK From: Ken Javor [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 27 December 2016 15:08 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [PSES] Practical ethics? -- text version I may be missing something here, but anything the Army procures that might be used around NVG has to be NVG-use qualified. Sounds as if someone dropped the ball levying that requirement in this situation. The system is broken if there is no contractual requirement and the entire thing hangs on one engineer's knowledge and integrity. Ken Javor Phone: (256) 650-5261 From: John Allen <[email protected]> Reply-To: John Allen <[email protected]> Date: Tue, 27 Dec 2016 10:12:53 -0000 To: <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [PSES] Practical ethics? -- text version I had similar problems with customers as well, especially when the company I worked for was doing sub-contract Safety Case work for a supplier of armoured tractors for the UK MoD! Neither our customer "wanted to know" when I raised some safety-related "issues" about issues about the tractors and what they were going to be used for in Kandahar province during the time the Royal Engineers were working there to support UK ground forces in the fight against the Taliban, such as the following question: ³These vehicles will be used at night with night vision goggles (NVG), and so have the users been trained in using them at night with such goggles?² (if you thought even slightly "hard" about the subject you could foresee a lot of very realistic hazardous situations!) The initial, and for a long time, response was simply that the troops had been trained to use NVG (³and that was good enough²) but, as the Safety Case Engineer on the project, I could not ³let go² of the issue until I considered that it was well on the way to being dealt with. It took about a year, but, finally, ³someone² in the Army decided that they would have to do night-time trials with those vehicles using NVG, and I think that they were then ³rather surprised² to find out that there were a lot of unforeseen and hazardous issues with trying to use them under the typical operating conditions so much so that they mandated that similar trials should be performed on any vehicle type to be used with NVG. There were also a number of other, sometimes less potentially serious, hazard issues with those projects that I did not ³let go of² until I considered they were well on the way to being solved, and, generally, they were. You could say that I had been ³vindicated², but all the above cut little ice with the MoD project team or our direct sub-contract customer, and the latter then stated emphatically that they did not want me working on any future safety case project for them! That, of course, made me ³less than popular² with my own company¹s management, and resulted in my being given little or no new ³chargeable² work for most of the rest of the time I worked for them, which, in turn, made my situation there far more stressful L. ³Ethics² versus ³personal survival²??? John E Allen W. London, UK -----Original Message----- From: Cortland Richmond [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: 27 December 2016 00:35 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [PSES] Practical ethics? -- text version One problem for engineers is that they work for people whose intent is to make money, and who are remarkably resistant to spending any more than is necessary to barely meet requirements and get products on the market. That is actually forgivable; what isn't forgivable is a willingness to accept not meeting performance, regulatory, or even safety requirements, accepting settlements and fines as part of the cost of doing business to make a little more on each unit that goes out the door. I wonder if ethics classes are doing anything to fix that. Ethics Lesson: Many years ago, late at night, an armed helicopter landed at a base where I was stationed, with a radio problem that kept the pilot from talking to troops under attack. I was unable to fix the problem no matter what I replaced, and over the next few days, no one else in our maintenance shop could figure it out either. But soldiers probably died that night because their close air support was gone. Finally, I had the crew-chief run the rotor speed up to what the pilot had reported and, at some risk to myself, followed the cabling the length of the airframe until I found one assembly at the tip of the tail fin, right next to the spinning rotor, where the RF was being interrupted and reflected. Taking it inside to the test bench, I discovered an internal capacitor lead had crystallized and broken, and -- at just one engine setting -- the ends of the break were vibrating enough to render radio transmissions unintelligible. I might take some pride in finding that when nobody else could -- but people may have died because I was too tired, too lazy, or just not thinking well enough to to try that earlier. Died. That's an ethics class no one should have to take. Three rubber grommets could have prevented it, and I wonder how much was saved by leaving them out... How many wounded or dead (if any) I can't say. I once shut down a manager complaining an AED's EMC Test Plan I'd been contracted to write was too hard to pass and too expensive to meet. Never mind that the requirements had been increased, and all their own engineers were busy bringing existing products up to the new standard; when he asked why I'd made the test so hard I told him: "I don't want you to kill people whose lives you're trying to save." Ethics -- the hard way. Cortland Richmond -- 26 December 2016 > - ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message is from the IEEE Product Safety Engineering Society emc-pstc discussion list. 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To post a message to the list, send your e-mail to <[email protected]> All emc-pstc postings are archived and searchable on the web at: http://www.ieee-pses.org/emc-pstc.html Attachments are not permitted but the IEEE PSES Online Communities site at http://product-compliance.oc.ieee.org/ can be used for graphics (in well-used formats), large files, etc. Website: http://www.ieee-pses.org/ Instructions: http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html (including how to unsubscribe) <http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html> List rules: http://www.ieee-pses.org/listrules.html For help, send mail to the list administrators: Scott Douglas <[email protected]> Mike Cantwell <[email protected]> For policy questions, send mail to: Jim Bacher <[email protected]> David Heald <[email protected]> - ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message is from the IEEE Product Safety Engineering Society emc-pstc discussion list. To post a message to the list, send your e-mail to <[email protected]> All emc-pstc postings are archived and searchable on the web at: http://www.ieee-pses.org/emc-pstc.html Attachments are not permitted but the IEEE PSES Online Communities site at http://product-compliance.oc.ieee.org/ can be used for graphics (in well-used formats), large files, etc. Website: http://www.ieee-pses.org/ Instructions: http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html (including how to unsubscribe) <http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html> List rules: http://www.ieee-pses.org/listrules.html For help, send mail to the list administrators: Scott Douglas <[email protected]> Mike Cantwell <[email protected]> For policy questions, send mail to: Jim Bacher <[email protected]> David Heald <[email protected]> - ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message is from the IEEE Product Safety Engineering Society emc-pstc discussion list. To post a message to the list, send your e-mail to <[email protected]> All emc-pstc postings are archived and searchable on the web at: http://www.ieee-pses.org/emc-pstc.html Attachments are not permitted but the IEEE PSES Online Communities site at http://product-compliance.oc.ieee.org/ can be used for graphics (in well-used formats), large files, etc. Website: http://www.ieee-pses.org/ Instructions: http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html (including how to unsubscribe) <http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html> List rules: http://www.ieee-pses.org/listrules.html For help, send mail to the list administrators: Scott Douglas <[email protected]> Mike Cantwell <[email protected]> For policy questions, send mail to: Jim Bacher <[email protected]> David Heald <[email protected]> - ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message is from the IEEE Product Safety Engineering Society emc-pstc discussion list. To post a message to the list, send your e-mail to <[email protected]> All emc-pstc postings are archived and searchable on the web at: http://www.ieee-pses.org/emc-pstc.html Attachments are not permitted but the IEEE PSES Online Communities site at http://product-compliance.oc.ieee.org/ can be used for graphics (in well-used formats), large files, etc. Website: http://www.ieee-pses.org/ Instructions: http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html (including how to unsubscribe) <http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html> List rules: http://www.ieee-pses.org/listrules.html For help, send mail to the list administrators: Scott Douglas <[email protected]> Mike Cantwell <[email protected]> For policy questions, send mail to: Jim Bacher <[email protected]> David Heald <[email protected]> - ---------------------------------------------------------------- This message is from the IEEE Product Safety Engineering Society emc-pstc discussion list. To post a message to the list, send your e-mail to <[email protected]> All emc-pstc postings are archived and searchable on the web at: http://www.ieee-pses.org/emc-pstc.html Attachments are not permitted but the IEEE PSES Online Communities site at http://product-compliance.oc.ieee.org/ can be used for graphics (in well-used formats), large files, etc. Website: http://www.ieee-pses.org/ Instructions: http://www.ieee-pses.org/list.html (including how to unsubscribe) List rules: http://www.ieee-pses.org/listrules.html For help, send mail to the list administrators: Scott Douglas <[email protected]> Mike Cantwell <[email protected]> For policy questions, send mail to: Jim Bacher: <[email protected]> David Heald: <[email protected]>
